the ramblings of a self confessed Pocky addict

Itsu Chicken Udon

I was out shopping in Sainsbury’s not something I often do and they were selling Itsu’s Chiken Udon pots so I thought I’d give it a go. If I’d read the outside more clearly I might have noticed the words ‘Indian inspired’ which should have put me right off. Chicken is itself an unusual choice for Udon since it’s usually paired with some sort of dashi broth.

Each tub comes with a printed cardboard pot and quite a substantial plastic lid. Inside you’ll find three packets, udon, soup paste and toppings. The toppings are mostly wake me, tofu and a small amount of spring onion. There are a lot of herbs in the soup, actually what got me suspicious of this pot was the smell of the soup paste since it smelt spicy.

You also get a spork inside each pot as well, I couldn’t make up my mind about this. It’s a nice addition but it feels unnecessary. I mean you don’t get a fork inside a pot noodle. It’d be convinient if you work in an office and your short on cutlery. It’s got a distinctive design which I actually quite liked, the spoon itself was quite deep for catching plenty of soup.

Let’s go back to that substantial lid for a moment. Nowhere on the cooking instructions does it say that you actually need it. It says to add water and stir, leave for three minutes but you don’t actually have to re-cover it. So why is it on there other than to make the product feel more substantial. Also as a side note the water fill level for this is printed on the outside of the pot which is awkward.

But what about the taste? So as I’ve said ‘Indian inspired’ wasn’t quite where I thought this would go. If your expecting curry udon then you’ll be dissapointed. It’s quite a thin soup with a tomato and chicken base. There’s lots of coriander in there too, it’s actually got more spice than I’d expect and the tomato is a little acidic. If your the sort of person who hates spicy foods there’s no warning on the outside of the pack to tell you this.

The udon in the pot seems to have been cut shorter than normal udon somehow too. The best thing about this is actually the toppings, the tofu pieces are actually reasonably sized. This pot has the lowest salt content of the three I’ve reviewed recently which is odd because it does taste salty. Overall I won’t be buying this again 4/10